may include information on how to use a product, along with background information, such as technical specifications or lists of materials

Procedures

explain how to perform a task or how a particlular process happens

Instructions

very specific, systematic lists of the actual steps involved in using a product or performing a procedure

Quick Reference card

for tasks that users perform on a limited basis, a short summary of comands

Reports

Focus on a specific problem, issue or topoc. May recommend a course of action or analyze a particular technology or situation.

Proposals

Specific recomendations and propose solutions to technical problems. Purpose is to persuade readers to improve conditions, accept a service or product, or otherwise support a plan of action.

Memos

Brief, vital form of communitcaion. Purpose: to inform, to persuade, to document or to encorage discussion.

Email

electronic form of a memo

Teamworks - Tips for Managing a Team Project

Appoint a group manager.Define a clear and definite goal.Identify the type of document required.Divide the tasks.Establish a timetable.Decide on a meeting schedule and format.Establish a procedure for responding to the work of other members.Develop a file-naming system for various dafts.Establish procedures for dealing with interpersonal problems.Select a group decision-making style.Appoint a different "observer" for each meeting.Decide how to evalute each member's contribution.Prepare a project management plan.Submit regular progress reports.

Discourse Community

"a group of people who share certian language using practices" any groups that share ways of communicating in terms of established routines, writing formats, ect.

Types of Discourse Communities

medical researchers, technical communicator, lawyers, physicians, etc

Audience Needs

"user centered" writings - first concern is to provide information the audience needs

Specific Purposes for Writing

To Persuade or To Inform

Analyzing Your Audience

Who will be reading, listening to or using this material?What special characterstics do they have?Which discourse community or communites do they belong to?What are their backgroung and attitude toward the subject?

Basic Audience Analysis

Learn as much as possible about the lanaguage and social dynamics of the community you are writing for.

Primary Audience

targeted group for the which the info is intended

Secondary Audience

people more distant from the writer who need to stay aware of developments in the organization but who will not directly act on or respond to the document

Analyzing the Communication Purpose

Why is this communication important?Why is it needed?What will users do with the information?Do the users share common membership in a specific discourse community?

Analyzing Communication Context

What are the organizational settings in which the document will be used?Are there other legal issues to consider?How much time do people at this company or with this job title have available to to perform the task?Are the readers of this document associated with a larger community of professionals, and if so, what professional values might they bring to the situation?Are the audience members from one culture only, or is this information directed at a cross-cultural audience?

your choice of words, phrases, clauses and sentences and how you connect these sentences - a way of expressing something (in language or art or music etc.) that is characteristic of a particular person or group of people or period

Style Guide

aggreed upon convetions for format, punctuation, spelling, grammer, illustration, design, and tone. "A document created to identify the spelling, layout and common grammatical issues within an organization."

Stylistics

an aspect of literary study that emphasizes the analysis of various elements of style (as metaphor of style)

Old Paradigm for Technical Prose

Technical writing should be objective (neutral), good technical writing should be impersonal, clinical, functional-anything but styllish.

New Paradigm for Technical Prose

writing not objective but persuasive and fundamentally rhetorical.

Rhetoric

the art of speaking and writing effectively

sub-rhetoric

words used deliberately to deceive people or to obscure issues

more rhetoric

language is used for sincere, not deceptive selling of a cause

Rhetoric B

language used in value disputes where the agenda calls for an open minded discussion of the issues but where you and I know all people have their own private visions to promote

Rhetoric A

words used for true inquiry- no hidden agendas, no predetermined point of view; it is the search for answers in honest pursuit of discovering and appraising our values and views.

CBS Therory

Clarity, Brevity and Sincerity

Aristotle defines Rhetoric

the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persasion

Ethos

generally to the writers personal character and credibility

Logos

refers to the data and information provided to appeal logically to an audience